


a brand new set of bones

by ThunderstormsandMemories



Series: 15 days of fatt 2021 [3]
Category: Friends at the Table (Podcast)
Genre: 15 Days of FatT, 15 Days of FatT 2021, Character Study, Dreams, Extended Metaphors, Grief/Mourning, Other, Siblings, and the parts that might be canon divergent or might loop back around to canon compliance, canon adjacent, depending on how you interpret it - Freeform, mostly canon compliant except for the part that are speculation, narrative parallels
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-11
Updated: 2021-03-11
Packaged: 2021-03-18 14:27:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,257
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29984241
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ThunderstormsandMemories/pseuds/ThunderstormsandMemories
Summary: Cas'alear rests. Integrity beckons. Together, they remember.
Relationships: Sokrates Nikon Artemisios/Integrity
Series: 15 days of fatt 2021 [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2195682
Comments: 1
Kudos: 7





	a brand new set of bones

**Author's Note:**

> Written for 15 Days of Friends at the Table, for the prompt "orbit" which I took very literally and then wrote a very metaphorical fic anyway
> 
> Major spoilers through PZN 33, minor character spoilers from PZN 43 (nothing beyond what's in the episode description), and maybe some implications for the end of PZN 47 and/or the post-mortem if you want to read it that way
> 
> Contains: depictions of canonical character deaths, violence (including gun violence), non-graphic descriptions of injuries and medical equipment/procedures, Integrity-typical body horror
> 
> On pronouns: Since I don't think we've really gotten established canonical pronouns for Integrity yet and I think both they and it have been used in episodes, I've written Integrity as using both they and it

Cas’alear’s body slept, recovering from their brush with death, or rather with Motion, not that there was much difference between the two, with the best medical equipment that Millenium could find—bartered for with smugglers, stolen on pirate raids, scrounged from the bowels of Fort Icebreaker—humming and blinking and beeping as it kept them alive while they recovered. And while their body rested, they dreamed.

* * *

They were home, in the palace where they’d grown up in the capital city on the capital planet of Stel Apostolos, all columns and spires and sweeping, dynamic lines, chasing after their sibling. They were young, in the dream. They must’ve been, because surely the ceilings weren’t really that high, or the doorways so cavernous and gaping, like mouths open and ready to devour misbehaving royal children, and Dahlia, running ahead of cas just barely in sight, was a child too, their hair loosely bound in a crown of flowers and their laughter carefree in a way cas hadn’t heard in years. But cas’ legs wouldn’t move properly, like cas was running through water, or under the influence of military surgeon-grade anaesthetics, and no matter how hard cas tried, Dahlia stayed just out of reach.

It occurred to Cas’alear, as they ran, that this wasn’t how the royal palace ought to look, though they knew that that was where they were. It was too airy and open, and the sunlight streaming in through the windows—there shouldn’t have been so many windows—had more of a golden tint that it should’ve, and Cas’alear didn’t recognize any of the sculptures they passed, though they thought they still remembered each of their ancestors that had been memorialized in this corridor.

Dahlia was completely out of sight now, and Cas’alear followed the bright, clear sound of their laughter, and the trail of wet footsteps and flower petals, through a doorway at the end of the hall, tripping over the threshold with heavy, leaden feet, and when cas looked up, they were in the throne room.

The throne room in the palace where they’d grown up had been in the opposite wing of the palace from the one they were playing in, full of long shadows and ceremonial weapons that remained wickedly functional despite their age, and it had been an ominous and foreboding space. They’d been nervous setting foot in it as a child, though as they’d spent more time there as one of Dahlia’s advisors, it had come to feel like just another room. A room with an important purpose, to be sure, and a room that contained a great deal of power, but still just a room nonetheless. This throne room, with its arched ceiling and broad, fluted columns and elegant marble statues, stained glass in the windows and unfamiliar names carved into the walls, terrified them for reasons they couldn’t even begin to name.

The Apokine sat on the throne, their face as stony and inexpressive as those of the statues around them, except they were no Apokine that Cas’alear recognized, neither Dahlia nor their parent. But they sat on the throne like there was no other place in the galaxy they could sit, a metallic circlet of leaves around their temples, tapping one hand impatiently on the arm of the throne.

And then there were soldiers, at Cas’alear’s side and at their back, awaiting their command, and the Apokine was on their feet, shouting, and Cas’alear squeezed their eyes shut, willing themself to wake up or at least dream about something else, something that didn’t fill them with this much dread. They knew how it felt, the shift in the air right before an ambush, and they _didn’t want to be here_.

And then a gunshot rang out, and Cas’alear opened their eyes to see their own parent dead on the floor at their feet and blood splashed across the strange scaled body armor covering their arms. They closed their eyes again, trying to blink away the horrible scene as the soldiers spread out around them, setting up defensive positions around the room, and when they opened their eyes again, it was the strange Apokine looking up at them with open, empty eyes, and when they blinked one more time it was Dahlia, blood bubbling up from a bullet hole in their chest, and they fell to their knees, trying to staunch the bleeding with their own hands, gloved but no longer armored, and they knew basic field medicine—every Apostolosian soldier did—but they were no doctor, and they wished Cass was there. Wait. They were Cas, right? Weren’t they?

But they were Cas’alear, not Cassander, and there was nothing they could do to stop the bleeding.

 _I’m sorry, Dahlia_ , they tried to say, but what came out, in a choked sob that they didn’t recognize as their own, was, “Why couldn’t you listen?” as they clutched the body and wept.

A hand tapped on their shoulder, and they reached for their sword before realizing that they weren’t wearing one, that their tactical gear had holsters for guns and grenades and a deadly assortment of gear that they thought hadn’t been used since prior to unification with the Principality, and they looked up into the face of their Apokine, as alive as they’d been when they’d ordered Cas’alear to Icebreaker, their hair swept up in a tight braid, their lips pressed together in a tired smile, their scales carefully painted on across their cheekbones as was fashionable for Apostolosians who had not been born with their own, not quite wearing enough glittering eyeshadow to hide the dark circles under their eyes.

“Rise,” they said. “There is no need to bow to me. Not now.” Cas’alear took the hand they offered, the rings on each finger to represent each of the five Stels cold against cas’ skin, and looked down at the floor, expecting to still see their corpse, but the body was gone, and the rich blood-soaked carpet was gone, and beneath their feet was the faintly vibrating metal walkway of a spaceship.

When cas looked back to their Apokine, cas didn’t recognize their face, what little of it cas could see through the dark veil thrown over their head, either of thick fabric or fine metal mesh, cas couldn’t quite tell. Nestled on top of the cowl was a crown of sharp gold spikes, and their hands were encased in claw-like gauntlets. That wasn’t their sibling anymore, cas was sure of it. They had studied their history, though, and recognized the description from Dahlia’s revelation of the deception of the Principality. This was the last true Apokine of the Apostolosian empire.

“You have served me well,” they continued, in a voice that was quiet and commanding. Dahlia could be both of those things as well, but this Apokine was nothing like Dahlia. Dahlia, for all that they were the Apokine and the Princept, was still Cas’alear’s sibling, their best friend and earliest confidante, and though they had Cas’alear’s absolute loyalty, they did not need to command it. It was given freely, along with cas’ love and respect. Their loyalty to this Apokine was no less absolute, and no less freely given, but the love they felt for their sovereign was that of a worshipper to a god, or a mech to its pilot. They would give up everything for their Apokine, and in many ways they already had, just to be here.

“Thank you,” they said.

“And now I ask you to serve me one last time,” said the Apokine. “You know what the stakes are. Will you see this through?”

“With my life,” said Cas’alear, and the Apokine nodded and reached out to clasp Cas’alear’s arm, where that strange scaled armor was spreading across their skin to meet the Apokine’s touch, and for a brief, dizzying moment, Cas’alear _was_ the Apokine, looking at themself through the shadowy veil. Except their silhouette was all wrong, their build light and wiry, with none of Cas’alear’s broad shoulders, and that wasn’t Cas’alear’s face. No tattoos, for one thing, and what little they could see of their scales were pale, almost silver, but they couldn’t really tell under all the scarring and skin grafts, which they didn’t recognize as theirs either, although maybe that was how they looked now, after-

_(A flash of memory, cutting through the dream: the scream of twisting metal as Ataraxia’s limbs were torn off, the horrible sickly glow of Asepsis, Broun’s voice in their ear telling them to get out of there as they scrambled to regain control of their mech’s remaining legs, the energy beams boosted past their safe limits, desperate to land even one hit on the Demiurgos. And then a flash of the night sky, the familiar constellations, and then red, and then nothing-)_

* * *

In the infirmary on Fort Icebreaker, the beeping of one of the many monitors surrounding the body of Cas’alear grew more insistent. The young medic stationed to watch them looked at the numbers, concerned, but there was nothing they could do other than watch and wait and hope. They were Apostolosian too, and they knew the regard in which the Glorious Princept, their Apokine, held their highly celebrated sibling. Losing Cas’alear would be a tough blow for Millennium Break, but their movement was bigger than any one figure and they would survive it. Losing Cas’alear would devastate Dahlia, and they didn’t like to think about what would happen if Millennium Break had to bear the brunt of the Apokine’s anger.

They fussed with the bandages across Cas’alear’s chest, just in case the dressing needed changing, just to feel like they were doing something, and while they worried, Cas’alear continued to dream.

* * *

They were the Apokine, still, but now the figure standing before them, one forearm clasped against theirs, was their sibling, their face covered in an elaborate white porcelain mask, but they’d known them since they were a child and would recognize them anywhere. “I’m sorry, Eudora,” they said, and their sibling laughed.

“I think that’s the only time I’ve ever heard you say that,” said Eudora, with a sad little chuckle, slightly muffled behind their mask.

“I would not ask this of you if I didn’t have any other choice,” they said, “and perhaps that is selfish of me, to want to protect you and keep you with me still.”

“I would do it without you asking,” said Eudora, and for a moment Cas’alear was staring at their own face as they convinced Dahlia to send them to Fort Icebreaker, “because you need it to be done.” That was what they’d said to Dahlia, too, that it needed to be done. And Dahlia, already fighting a war on two fronts, had agreed.

 _Make sure you come home_ , Dahlia had said, last time they’d spoken, pulling Cas’alear into a tight hug that rumpled the panels of their freshly-ironed uniform jacket. It was half an order and half a plea, both to keep themself safe and to remember where their loyalty lay, to remember that as useful as Millennium Break might be as a thorn in the side of Kesh and the Curtain and the Pact, Cas’alear’s place was with Apostolos and Dahlia. It wasn’t that they’d forgotten that; they’d just realized that it wasn’t the only place they could belong, and that the Apostolosian state mythology wasn't the only thing they believed. _You’re already a hero, and I need you to be my sibling._

“You’ll be a hero,” said Cas’alear in the soft, deadly voice of the Apokine, knowing it to be an empty promise even as they said it. This was a desperate last stand, the kind of work that was done in the shadows where the best you could hope for was a quick death and a weakened opponent. They weren’t quite sure what exactly the work was, in this case, but they knew that they would never see their sibling again. They saw a flash of their sibling’s features beneath the mask despite the mask remaining firmly in place, and Eudora was not young anymore but they would never grow any older than this. Their hair would never grey and their scales would never fade and they would never have any laughter lines around their eyes. Not that anyone would see, behind the mask they would always have to wear. Cas’alear wasn’t sure how they knew that, but they knew it like it was their own mission parameters: Eudora must always wear the mask.

And then the scene shifted, and they saw vague impressions of a battlefield, smoke and shouting and muddy, trampled grass, and a heavily pixelated face—familiar features, greenish-black scales—and heard an echo of the words, _I’ll make sure they remember you_.

Eudora let go of their hand, and they were themself again. Or rather, they were the person who served the Apokine, which in a way meant they were the person they had always been. Not always, technically, since they had been born the only child of the previous Apokine, and though succession was not guaranteed, the crown was often passed down through family lines. It was an odd thought, and an uncomfortable one, to consider that if not for Dahlia, Cas’alear might have been called on to prove themself worthy of sovereignty. It was uncomfortable not because cas regretted it in any way or resented Dahlia for the way things were, but rather, it was uncomfortable because cas was so thankful that it wasn’t the case. They had never wanted to be Apokine, and wanted to be Princept even less. What they wanted was what they already had—a sibling, friends, a purpose, a life they enjoyed living—and they had always been more interested in the narrative of history than the algebra of empire.

There was pity in the Apokine’s voice when they said, “This is not the first impossible mission you’ve attempted for me, Orbit Shard. But it is the first in which I do not expect you to succeed. Hope for it, yes, always, but to expect to shatter the Principality? That would be foolish, and though I have not always proven myself to be the wisest of commanders-” flashes of a different battle, of drifting space debris and the glow of laser fire and silence only broken by the shaky sound of Orbit Shard’s breathing, “-but I am no fool.”

“No, Apokine,” said Cas’alear, rather, Orbit, though Cas’alear looked out through their eyes. They had never once considered the Apokine a fool, though they knew that it was the Apokine’s order that led to that disastrous mission going so badly wrong. They had served the Apokine closely and faithfully ever since, and never again in all that time had the Apokine’s orders led them astray.

“If it seems likely that you should fail,” the Apokine continued, “do not let that which you carry fall into the hands of the Principality. They have no integrity of their own; I refuse to let them borrow mine.”

At those words, the strange armor appeared once again, spreading out from Orbit’s spine with a strange prickling sensation until their entire body was encased with dark metal scales, including, just for a moment, their eyes. When their vision cleared, the Apokine was gone and they were on the outside hull of what looked like a combination space station-royal palace built around an asteroid, floating peacefully against a shifting pastel backdrop that shimmered like the inside of a nebula.

They didn’t need to breathe, not with their face covered by Integrity’s nano-armor, and they barely felt the crunch of metal under their fingers as they tore a hole in the wall and propelled themself inside, amidst blaring alarms from the hull breach and a shower of gunfire that Integrity deflected harmlessly away. Not so harmless for the soldiers caught up in the ricochet, and soon they stood in the corridor alone except for the fallen bodies at their feet. The automatic safety systems had kicked in by then, temporarily plugging up the gap in the wall, which was fine. In the unlikely event they needed an escape route, they could always make a new one.

With that done, they ripped through the interior wall, directly into what should have been the Princept’s secondary safe room. The primary one went out of use after the second assassin, the Branched who’d been so interested in Integrity, had failed in her attempt on the Princept’s life but succeeded in smashing up his first line of defenses. The first three assassins had all failed, and now it was their turn.

The Princept, wearing a Kesh military-issue spacesuit but recognizable from his features, visible behind the visor, and the deference shown to him by everyone else in the room, raised his gun and shot at them, but their own reflexes plus the added advantage of Integrity made them too fast for him. They made quick work of his soldiers, and then shot the Princept in the chest and in the head before he had a chance to speak. Couldn’t trust those Kesh politicians, or any of their lies. But as his visor shattered they saw his face—his real face, not what had apparently just been a projection—and it didn’t match the pictures Orbit had been shown. The Princept had used a decoy, sacrificed one of his own people in his place, and Orbit had failed.

The thought crossed their mind that they could destroy the entire asteroid, that with the right tinkering their weapons could become volatile enough to blow up the entire place, killing the Princept no matter where in the palace they were. Almost as soon as it occurred to them, they felt a voice in their mind that said, _We do not sacrifice innocents as collateral damage_ , and saw flashes of someone else’s old memory: they were arguing, arms crossed defiantly, in a meeting room on an unfamiliar spaceship, which their brain helpfully suggested should be called the Kingdom Come, that it wasn’t treason to want to talk to your family, and cas’ heart ached.

And then someone shot them, and they didn’t have any more time to get lost in someone else’s memories or argue about ethics with an ancient Divine.

They fought off the first wave of attackers, but soon there were too many of them, with nets to limit their movement and guns that shot strange glass bullets that somehow pierced Integrity’s armor, and then they were falling, falling farther than the distance between them and the floor, and they saw the constellations of the Principality, and wreckage of the battle that had given Orbit their position, and the rolling green fields of the planet Apokine. They heard the Princept’s voice: he’d shown up in person, of course he had, the smug bastard, and maybe Orbit couldn’t remember his face clearly because to Cas’alear he just looked like Cynosure Kesh.

The dream became confusing, chaotic, more splashes of color and pain and fear than clear images, and Cas’alear couldn’t tell what happened to Integrity. Cas couldn’t even really tell what was Orbit, holding desperately to their loyalty even at the end, and what was cas’ own memories, the spear of the Demiurgos impossibly large on a scale that cas’ brain couldn’t make sense of as it tore open the cockpit of the Ataraxia, the sickening weightless sensation of being ejected as cas was losing consciousness from blood loss, the distant sound of A.O. Rooke’s voice saying, “C’mon, stay with me, buddy, you’re gonna be okay, I’m gonna get you to safety.” Cas tried to answer him, but he wasn’t there, and they were alone on that green field, laying in a small crater like one made by, for example, someone wearing near-indestructible body armor being knocked out of the sky.

Cas’alear saw their body from the outside, like they were floating somewhere above themself, and they knew it was them, or at least the person they were supposed to identify with in this dream, even though the body wasn’t cas’. The wings of their armor were crumpled underneath them, and their nano-armor was pulled back enough to reveal their face, laughter lines around their eyes and their mouth frozen in a sharp-toothed grimace, their charred hair cut short and tied up away from their neck.

Their image had been wiped from history after the Demarchy once again gave way to the Empire, and they’d been considered just as much of an embarrassment as their altruistic ideals, but finally, seeing them with their Divine, Cas’alear put together what cas was seeing. It was not unfamiliar iconography, after all, though it had fallen out of fashion long before Apostolos had been absorbed by the Principality: the rebellious scion who had overreached and been cast down for their hubris, for their blasphemy against the Apostolosian state. This was Sokrates Nikon Artemisios, Candidate of Integrity, founder of the Golden Branch Demarchy, dying alone and forgotten.

 _Not alone_ , said the voice inside their head. _Not alone. We have- had each other. We weren’t alone._

The field was silent and still except for a group of mechs they saw withdrawing in the distance, having wiped out all their opposition. They were an old style of mech, back when they were still called riggers, but there was something strange about their movements, too deliberate and uniform to be controlled by individual pilots, never stopping or hesitating, only surging forward together. They reminded Cas’alear of the Black Century, but this was millennia before Motion’s time, and as cas looked at them, cas felt a buzzing dissatisfaction in cas’ mind. Why were they resting, when there was so much work to be done?

No. Cas’alear had not been taken in by Motion, and her persuasion was far more subtle and insidious, couched in noble-sounding rhetoric about progression and glory. Cas would not be taken in by this blunt version of the same coercion from Rigour.

When cas turned their attention back to Sokrates, their armor had fully retracted and their wings folded up impossibly small into the node on the back of their neck, leaving behind scorched impressions in the dirt, as if their wings had burned away rather than collapsed into themselves. The node then detached, taking the spinal column shape Cas’alear recognized from writings on old royal treasures as the form Integrity took was it didn’t have an elect. Without Integrity, Sokrates looked smaller, and younger, and so horribly fragile, and Cas’alear knew this was just a dream and that they were long dead, but cas didn’t feel right just leaving them there without doing anything. Cas had chosen their sibling as cas’ Eidolon, after all, and that alone meant cas had a responsibility to them, if their own accomplishments and devotion to what Apostolos could have been wasn’t enough. To many Apostolosians, it probably wouldn’t have been. But Cas’alear, both as a student of history and a royal sibling who was uncomfortably close to repeating Sokrates’s first treason, thought they deserved honor and sympathy.

Cas'alear moved closer, meaning to pay respects, but their hand moved of its own accord and reached out for the curved metal surface of Integrity. They held Integrity in their hands, feeling its weight and the humming of life within it, and when they looked up again they were in an empty library, the sort of dusty basement backroom where archivists kept material that was too delicate for bare hands or direct sunlight. Around them were locked filing cabinets and boxes of paper records, blurry in the dim light, but in front of them was Integrity, clear and shining. They communicated without any words, or maybe Integrity had not seen it fit to share those particular words with Cas’alear, private as they must have been, and then, without hesitation, they reached up, swept their hair out of the way, and pressed the spine of Integrity to their own back.

At first it hurt, more than a tattoo but less than the slash of an energy sword, and then it mostly felt weird, a shiver down their spine, and they poked at it experimentally, both feeling the touch and feeling Integrity feeling the touch, and then ran their hand up their back, trying to get used to how the new addition felt, like they were zipping up a dress. As if prompted by the thought, the dream shifted again, and they stood in front of a full-length mirror in a sun-drenched bedroom, with a high ceiling and more fluted marble columns.

Their dress was in a style that Cas’alear would’ve called anachronistic, if cas had seen it in a movie, too modern for the time period they were in, but still recognizably historical. It was too sleek to count as a chiton, without any of the militaristic touches that marked the formalwear of present-day Stel Apostolos, high in the front but cut low in the back so that Integrity was fully visible. They had been a scientist, not a soldier, and their bare arms and shoulders were less muscular than Cas’alear’s, marked in some places with the lines of a scale pattern where Integrity’s armor had been extended over them for too long.

They were halfway through applying their lipstick, a bright glittery shade of turquoise that matched their scales, while their eyes were lined with sparkling gold that matched their dress. _You look lovely as always, my dearest_ , said Integrity, _but we’re going to be late_.

Sokrates laughed, flapping a careless hand at that. “It’s fine,” they said. “Not like we’ll miss much anyway. All the cool people always show up a little late.”

 _Is that so_ , said Integrity dryly, and Sokrates laughed at them again and patted the node on their neck soothingly.

Alive, Sokrates was constantly moving, fidgeting with their hair and their dress, shifting from foot to foot and admiring the swish of fabric in the mirror. It wasn’t the steady inexorability of Rigour or the relentless crush of Motion, it was just that they were so full of life, bursting with energy and humor and excitement and ideas. They had a smear of lipstick on their pointed teeth, and when they went to wipe it off they accidentally smudged their lips, but they laughed at that too, and Integrity good-naturally reminded them of where they’d set the makeup wipes.

“What would I do without you?” they said.

 _Miss me, I expect_ , said Integrity.

“Yeah, I would, buddy,” said Sokrates. “Now, let’s go. We’ve got a party to crash.”

 _We were invited_ , said Integrity. _Your sibling is the host_.

“Details, babe, details,” Sokrates scoffed, and they swept out of their room, opening the door directly into the ballroom, which could not possibly have been the real layout of the palace, but who was Cas’alear to argue with their subconscious?

The ballroom was a strange mix of styles, or rather, when Cas’alear looked in one direction, it was the dynamic, angular style of the ballroom in Dahlia’s palace, with swords and Principality banners on the wall, and then they looked in a different direction and saw columns and marble, and then when they looked back in the first direction, the swords were replaced by stained glass and gold leafing, and the banners were now emblazoned with the crests of the Demarchy and Old Apostolos.

It occurred to cas that it had been a long time since they’d seen Dahlia, and this dream had started by chasing after them, so they must have something to say to them. They owed them something, probably: a conversation, an explanation, an apology. Dahlia had to be here somewhere. They were the Apokine, and this was their palace, and Integrity had said that their sibling was hosting.

The crowd was so thick that they practically had to shove their way through to get anywhere, and everyone was wearing a mask, though they recognized many of them anyway, and when they reached up to touch their face their fingers touched the cool metal of a mask they hadn’t remembered putting on.

That must have been the theme of the party, and they’d just momentarily forgotten, but they had to be in the right place because all their friends were there. There was Ariadne, the person they’d defended from Addax on the Kingdom Come, greeting them eagerly in a delicate mask of woven gold and promising them that they’d be pleased with their latest report from Gemm, and A.O. Rooke, in a complicated, multi-faceted black mask with a beak like a panther, who clapped them on the back and handed them a glass of something clear and fizzy. When they sipped at it, they tasted the familiar sweet artificial-fruit flavor of their favorite childhood soda, the kind that wasn’t made anymore, and had only ever been sold in one city on one planet.

“Good, right?” said A.O., and Cas’alear agreed, pausing a moment longer. They knew they had somewhere to be, but surely they could take a moment to talk to their friends.

“Nice to see you here,” said a voice from behind them, and they whirled around to see Zig’ell, resplendent in a showy feathered red mask and a very well-tailored matching suit, with a deep red, almost maroon orchid pinned to his collar, and it took them a moment to realize that zig shouldn’t seem nearly so pleased to see them. True, his promotion hadn’t been his idea, but if he’d wanted to stay with the Swordbreakers, Cas’alear could’ve arranged it. Cas had wanted zig to stay. Cas had thought zig wanted to stay, and that was what hurt the most. It wasn’t just that he left. It was, after all, a prestigious assignment, though Cas’alear never would’ve taken it. But then again, Cas’alear liked their reputation for taking on challenges above their tier, liked the freedom with which they could operate because of that, and they liked the Swordbreakers, considering them just as much their family as Dahlia was. There were plenty of opportunities for glory, though not for GLORY which, cas thought bitterly, had apparently made a difference.

But the part of Zig’ell’s--or Xiphion’s, as most people now knew him, betrayal that stung the worst was that Cas’alear hadn’t expected it, and cas had thought they’d known each other better than that.

“No, I can’t say that it is,” said Cas’alear.

“Oh, come on,” said Zig’ell, though his smile had faltered. “You should’ve come with me, you know we’re meant to be fighting side-by-side.”

“Then come back to the Swordbreakers,” said Cas’alear. “There’s still space for you.” Not as much as Cas’alear would’ve expected, since their other soldiers had rallied around cas and more than made up for Zig’ell’s absence, even before A.O. started working with them, all but filling Zig’ell’s place in their formations. His piloting was different from zig’s, but he was just as effective as an ace, and Cas’alear had quickly gotten used to the shimmering, darting motions of the Panther.

“You still don’t get it, do you?” said Zig’ell. “Big things are happening, for us and for Apostolos, and I want you to be part of it.” He held out his hand to Cas’alear, who stared at it, feeling a prickling sensation on the back of their neck. As much as they missed him, as much as they wanted to stay and convince him that he had made a mistake, they didn’t have time for that. They needed to find Dahlia.

“You may have Valour,” they said coldly, “but I have Integrity, and I know which one I prefer.”

Zig’ell opened his mouth, but before zig could speak they were already walking away, pushing their way through the crowd. The inconsistencies in the ballroom felt more sinister now, the sea serpent of the Stel twisting its way up the Old Apostolosian columns, the Demarchy banners tattered and frayed, falling away from the walls to reveal cracks in the stonework, the faces on the statues smashed in but eerily familiar underneath the damage.

The other party-goers were no longer wearing formal dress of any period, instead clad in ragged combat gear and all of their faces hidden by the same blank masks, and they knew that they were surrounded by Motion’s walking, fighting corpses. They tried to shout their sibling’s name but found they couldn’t remember it and what came out instead was the name _Euanthe_.

Where _was_ Euanthe? Why hadn’t they been at the party? They’d never been a fan of frivolous occasions, even before their injuries and the subsequent end of their military career, but they cared enough for propriety to always make an appearance when invited, and they didn’t hold events in venues that weren’t wheelchair accessible.

And then they remembered that Euanthe was dead, and that cas didn’t know who Euanthe was, beyond the least famous of the three Pelagios siblings. But Euanthe had died late in the fighting against Rigour, after Sokrates themself, so if Euanthe was dead, then so were they, but they needed to find their sibling, there was something they had to say-

They saw them, finally, up on the dais at the end of the room, in full formal military regalia, epaulettes gleaming on their shoulders, a ceremonial sword at their side that had been snapped in two halfway up the blade, and a crown of golden laurels resting on their head above a long elegant braid. They clamored up onto the dais and when they reached them, Dahlia turned so that they could see their face covered in the same elaborate bone-white mask that Eudora had worn, the cascading flowers that hung from one side striking against their dark hair.

“Dahlia,” they said. “I’m so glad I found you. I need to tell you-” But then their sibling took off their mask, and underneath was a face that wasn’t theirs, though Cas’alear recognized it instantly. “Laurel?”

They gave a puzzled look and shook their head. “What? No, I’m-”

“Cassander,” said Cas’alear. “Of course.” Of course they recognized them, this person that they’d chosen to emulate, whose reputation had been so twisted up by propaganda that people like Laurel could get away with claiming to be the inheritors of Cassander’s legacy. Cassander the warlord, Cassander the martyr, the hero of the last battle against Rigour, instead of Cassander the doctor, the sibling, the diplomat, the person who was trying their best to balance their culture and their families and their duty who just wanted to keep everyone safe. That was the Cassander whose name Cas’alear had taken, and for a moment they saw recognition in their Eidolon’s eyes before Cassander nodded and said, gravely, “Remember, there are no only children on Apostolos.”

They reached out to touch Cas’alear’s face, their fingers reaching under the edge of their mask and prying it away, and cas caught a glimpse of sea glass and scales and Russian sage as it fell to the ground, landing in the damp sand at their feet with a muffled thump, and when they looked up Cassander was gone, and the ballroom was gone, and they stood alone on a wide sandy beach, a cold salt breeze blowing in off the ocean bringing with it the spray of the sea and the first few heavy rain drops of an autumn storm.

 _Not alone_ , they reminded themself. _Never alone_. And Integrity, in the back of their mind, radiated a sense of approval.

 _I apologize for_ , Integrity’s voice trailed off, and Cas’alear got the impression that if they'd had a body, it would’ve waved an arm to try to encompass everything cas had just seen, _all that. It has been some time since I’ve reached out, but you are familiar—_ Cas'alear felt the meaning of what Integrity was trying to say, the sense of mirrors and echoes and history etched in spiralling loops, and it was an uncomfortably Perennial concept but cas couldn't help but think that they were right— _and_ _I needed to warn you_.

“About what?” said Cas’alear, mind racing as cas tried to keep track of everything cas needed to be concerned about: the long-term sustainability and short-term survival of Millennium Break, the growing hostility between the Pact and the Curtain as they each stepped out of the shadows to claim the open authority they saw as rightfully theirs, their own role within Millennium Break and Apostolos, keeping the Swordbreakers safe and together through it all, Dahlia and their wars, always Dahlia.

 _There’s a storm over Apostolos_ , said Integrity, as the wind picked up around them, whipping sand up into their eyes, and the rain was coming down harder now, in frigid sheets that rolled in across the surf. The waves lapped at their feet, salt water sinking into their boots and washing away their fallen mask. With cas’ vision blurred from blinking away raindrops, the sea foam looked almost like flower petals. _Come find me_ , Integrity said.

“I promise,” said Cas’alear. “With my life.”

* * *

The young medic was starting to doze off. They were nearing the end of their shift, and their earlier moment of panic had receded as the readings normalized again and Cas’alear’s condition stabilized. Rain pounded against the outer hull of Fort Icebreaker, a steady white noise that lulled them to sleep while their patient’s chest rose and fell steadily beneath their bandages. Cas’alear slept peacefully now, a deep dreamless sleep, and somewhere beyond the rain and the sea and the stars, Integrity waited for their chosen candidate.

**Author's Note:**

> Title from Same Soul by PVRIS
> 
> Big shout-out to Transcripts at the Table for giving me the option of reading transcripts for research instead of trying to relisten to a bunch of episodes, and especially everyone responsible for the transcriptions of C/W 22 (The Broken Branch), C/W 21 (Crisis! A Solemn Vow Above the Sea of Counter/Weight), C/W 43 (A Splintered Branch, A Ringing Bell), PZN 31 (A Grand Premiere), PZN 33 (A Single Shot), R2S6 10 (Microscope Part 2), and R2S6 08 (For the Queen)
> 
> I can be found on [twitter](https://twitter.com/s_artemisios) where I have lots of feelings about Integrity, and Apostolosian traitors and exiles, and the narrative construction of history
> 
> [PZN SPOILERS] The thing about this fic is that I had the idea for it when Cas'alear first went into their coma after that Motion fight, but before I could write it, canon things (the Witch in Glass's aid, Dahlia having Integrity) happened that made it no longer canon-compliant speculation, but I liked the idea enough that I still wanted to write it, and I thought it would still work as a character study of both Integrity and Cas'alear. And then I realized that if I added some more metaphors it could become ambiguously canon-compliant again, because maybe Integrity is still lost and wants Cas'alear to find them. Or maybe it's with Dahlia, acting as a tool of empire, and would prefer not to be doing that. Who could possibly say. (I did also realize while writing this that the Dahlia & Integrity evidence was there from the beginning. Elects have flower names, so of course Dahlia has a Divine.)


End file.
